Catalog inconsistencies, questionable L's taken in real life, all of that shit notwithstanding, there's still nobody else fucking with him.


There are no other rappers out there who could fill up a playlist of 150-200 tracks of consistently DOPE shit, like 9/10 or above.


He is also the most lyrically talented rapper I've ever come across, especially when you consider the strength of subject matter he uses. Nobody else has ever combined the clever wordplay, cerebral storytelling, stream of consciousness raps, street shit, introspective shit quite like him.


Beat selection is his achilles heal, but even that has been overblown. The beats on Illmatic and It Was Written are almost all excellent. The Firm album had enough heat from Dre. I Am & Nastradamus were scattershot but still had heat strewn throughout. Stillmatic had strong production. The Lost Tapes had immaculate production. God's Son was produced very well. Street's Disciple was scattershot again, but Hip Hop Is Dead was his most well-produced album since probably It Was Written. Untitled was hit or miss, and wasn't my cup of tea aside from a few tracks, but I don't hold that against him at all. The man has given me nuff bangers over his career.

And none of this is taking into account a) all the classic and memorable guest verses he's dropped, from Wu, to Mobb, to AZ and so on and so on, and b) the wealth of unreleased material that is better than 95% of emcees' released catalogs. You could create 2-3 classic albums of just unreleased shit from 95-2000.


Impact wise, Nas is your favorite rapper's favorite rapper. As long as your favorite rapper wasn't born after the year 1990 and doesn't have the word "Lil" or "Young" in his name.



Nas' place in the game is firmly established as one of the GOATs, and to me personally there is nobody above him. If you don't have him in your top 5-10, YOU LOST. (see what I did there?)